Heaven from Hell

A recent study reports that more than half of all the people executed in America suffer from a mental illness.

Cruel and unusual punishment, indeed.

Originally I had planned to end the post by saying "Sometimes there are no words."  But for some reason this old proverb popped into my head:  "There but for the grace of God, go I."

Peace,
emaycee

Quod erat demonstrandum

Exhibit A:  Increases in the minimum wage are good for the economy, insist Liberals.

Ta-da!  Recent analysis shows that states that increased their minimum wage on January 1st of this year are showing faster job growth than those states that did not.

Exhibit B:  Corporate CEOs are overpaid, especially in relation to their workers, Liberals claim.

Voila!  Recent data shows that CEO compensation has virtually no correlation with company peformance, i.e. higher pay does not mean higher company returns.  Pay for performance, or so they say.

Just sayin'.

Peace,
emaycee

The whites of their eyes

Realizing that their one day strikes weren't enough, fast food workers voted unanimously in Chicago this past weekend to begin using civil disoedience in their quest for $15 an hour and the right to form a union.

This is step number two (though still on a small scale) in working class Americans fight for a living wage and to regain their seat at the table in America's economic well-being amidst our current plutocracy.

Hope it's successfull--because their third step is to go full French Revolution on their asses.

Peace,
emaycee

Priceless

The Satanic Temple has started a campaign asking that they not be bound by anti-abortion laws and are citing the Supreme Court's decision in the Hobby Lobby case to bolster its exemption from such laws.

While this particular example is likely more show than substance, it does demonstrate just how far from the main the idea of religious liberty can be taken.

It's what the Roberts 5 invited with their Burwell v. Hobby Lobby decision, and this will not likely be the last or most serious comeuppance the religious right will be facing over the next several years.

Peace,
emaycee

Hammer time!

A recent poll shows that 57% of women would be more likely to support a candidate who opposes the Knobby Jobby decision.  Seventy-one percent of women think a candidate who supports corporations being allowed to dictate birth control choices has his or her priorities out of whack.

So...can anyone explain to me why, here in Michigan, where we have a close contest for the Senate seat of retiring U.S. Senator Carl Levin, Democrat Gary Peters isn't absolutely lambasting republican Terri Lynn Land over this issue?  I mean not one commercial--and it's not like Land has any choice other than to back corporate rights on birth control.  Anti-choice forces here would crucify her if she didn't.

And it would be a nice reminder to that majority of women who do support Democrats on why they vote for us in the first place.  And it could be simple, too:  "Terri Lynn Land believes corporation have the right to make your family's birth control choices...."  Fade out.

Sheesh, it's politics--whenever the Gods throw you a hammer, pound away.

Peace,
emaycee

Dear God

And just to show that republican idiocy is pretty darn near universal, I give you (and you can keep him) the Mayor of Warren, Michigan, Jim Fouts:

Seems a local Christian group has set up a booth outside of city hall in Warren to minister to local fellow believers.  A local atheist petitioned Mayor Fouts for equal space to provide succor to non-believers and  information to those who may have questions about the existence of God.  Fouts refused the request, and while doing so, compared atheists to the Ku Klux Klan and Nazis, and said they wouldn't contribute to "community values."

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure that a) both the KKK and the Nazis would have considered themselves Christian-oriented organizations, and b) that atheists as a whole never lynched black Americans or murdered six million Jews.  And as far as community values goes...well, let's just say that I've been to Warren and when you drive through it, it isn't exactly Shangri-La.  Or even very close.  Fouts has plenty more to worry about than some harmless group that merely wants to present its case on equal footing.

Alas, republicans--ever putting the S-T-U-P-I-D in stupidity.

Peace,
emaycee

Welcome back, my friends, to the show that never ends

Cannot believe I used an ELP reference in the title.  Ugh.

Every now and again, I wonder why in the fuck I'm doing this.  I mean, I could be watching "Mad Men" or "Breaking Bad" or "Lost" or any number of critically acclaimed TV shows of the last few years, all of which I have never seen a single episode.  I could also be watching (insert excellent movie released in the last five years here).  Hell, I could go back to practicing my guitar regularly.

It seems, though, that every time I think about calling it quits. some republican somewhere comes up with some egregious bullshit and pulls me back in.

This is one of those times.

Alan Hays, a republican state senator from Florida, is introducing a bill that would make it mandatory (though parents could opt out for their kids) for students in his home state to watch convicted felon Dinesh D'Souza's film, "America" which is basically a conservative circle jerk riddled with inaccuracies   Funny thing is, in a republican controlled state with a republican Governor (or what passes for a Governor) Rick Scott, it just might pass.

You know, if Mr. Hays had recommended the movie to Florida's students, I'd have no problem with it.  If he suggested it to a local chapter of young republicans (oxymoron alert!) to show at one of their meetings, it'd be fine.  But mandatory?  Christ, this is the Florida state senate, not the Politburo.

And this is why I keep blogging--I'm pretty sure if I didn't keep venting about republican lunacy that the pressure would become too great and my head would explode.

Peace,
emaycee

Separate and unequal

Extell, a luxury apartment building in New York City that gets credits for building low income housing which allows them to expand their rich folk condos, has asked the city and received permission to have a separate door for the poor.

For fuck's sake, Francis.

When did being poor become the equivalent of being a leper?  Despite the best efforts of Big Business and the 1%, being poor still isn't contagious.  When did being poor become an eyesore like a Port-A-Potty?  We're talking about acknowledging our fellow human beings here  When did the rich get granted special privileges vis-a-vis not having to deign to see the poor?  Ah, never mind--that's been going on since the Reagan Devolution.

You know, the rich ain't like you and me--because they're assholes.

Peace,

emaycee

The lone ranger

Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick this week called on his state to use two abandoned military bases to help house some of the Central American refugees waiting at our borders until their hearings.

There are currently twenty-one Democratic Governors in American, and Patrick is the only one who has stepped up and said that we need to reach out to and take care of these children.

The only one.

It's sad statement for America that we only have one Governor who has the courage to say that sending children back to a death sentence in their home country is not what our country is about.

But it is a ray of hope, even if it's only the tiniest sliver of one.

Goddamnit, Democrats--do the right thing.

Peace,
emaycee

The hammer of justice

It doesn't surprise me that conservatives would turn to ugliness and false witness when it comes to the immigrant children from Central America arriving at the borders of the land of the free and the home of the brave.  Despite their disingenuous "Moi?" protests, it's their M.O.--if you aren't a white Christian, they aren't interested.

It does surprise (and disconcert) me, however, that Democrats are not pushing back on the hate and championing these children as political refugees--it's not only the right move morally, it's also the right move politically.  From President Obama to Harry Reid to Nancy Pelosi and on down the Democratic food chain, there is not one Democrat who should not be celebrating their supporters.   There is not one who should not be speaking out for them like Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley did this week--and without the bogus blowback because his reminder that we are America and we do not abandon helpless children made the Obama administration look bad with its continued calls for deportation that will send them back to the earth equivalent of hell.

My God, they're children from violence ravaged nations.  Let's turn them into productive American citizens--in time, they'll be a whole hell of a lot more worthwhile to America than any republican.

Peace,
emaycee

Corporate fail, ad infinitum

Like many states, the state of Michigan has turned its prison food distribution over to a private company, in our case, Aramark Corrections.  In what I'm sure comes as a great shock, Aramark has poved grossly inept in its handling of the food distribution for Michigan's prison population.

One thing it illustrates for certain, though, is that if you want to guarantee that American taxpayers pay more for worse service, you'll turn public run systems over to the private sector.

There's absolutely nothing these folks can't fuck up ten times better than our average citizens.

Peace,
emaycee

Wow

A staffer for Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder attended a private fundraiser for his Democratic challenger Mark Schauer wearing a pair of spyglasses (note:  at this point, a snicker, a guffaw, a "what the fuck?", a "for fuck's sake, Francis!" are all perfectly legitimate reactions), which she then proceeded to fucking lose and let fall in the hands of the Schauer campaign.

Now I have no problem with the Snyder campaign's tactic--bullshit trying to get a leg up in an election campaign has been done probably since the very first elections mankind ever held.

And I'm not surprised by the ineptness of the Snyder administration--I'd be hard pressed to name a single thing they've done right in the past four years here in Michigan.

What the story leaves me with, though, is hope.  Schauer is a good man, a good Democrat, and about as exciting as vanilla ice cream.  Snyder has the power of incumbency and wealth via the Koch Brothers, the DeVos family (of Amway fame), and his own fortune to make good King Midas envious.  Frankly, as much as I'd like to see Snyder go down to defeat, I thought the odds were long, at best.

But not so fast--if the Snyder campaign has to resort to such Donnie Dorko tactics, I've got to believe we have a much better chance than previously thought.

One tough nerd, indeed.

Peace,
emaycee

What Reagan hath wrought--the wiz kid edition

Thirty-three years ago next month, Ronald Reagan fired the Air Traffic Controllers and started the downward spiral both economically and psychologically that working class Americans have lived with this past generation.

In a related note, the leadership at WaterSaver Faucet Co. and its sister company, Guardian Equipment Co., have been monitoring their employees bathroom breaks, to make sure they don't exceed their allotment of time--six minutes per workday.  Thus far, nineteen employees have been disciplined for peeing and pooping too much on company time.

For all the bullshit we get from republicans about the sainted Reagan, this is his true legacy:  we now live in a time when not only can the people we work for control our sex lives (see also, Burwell v. Knobby Jobby), they can also fire us for taking a wiz.

Mine eyes have seen the glory, indeed.

Peace,
emaycee

Please please me

As I was driving to work yesterday, I drove past Loserville, Population 2--a.k.a., a booth with a couple of doofuses calling for the impeachment of President Obama, replete with big ass pictures of the President with a Hitler mustache.

Yikes.

This seems to be a republican theme of late, with the Queen of Dunceville, Sarah Palin, calling for Obama's impeachment over his immigration policies and proving she knows two words of Spanish ("no" and "mas").  Her would be protege, pretender and republican candidate for Senator from Iowa, Joni Ernst, was also caught this week calling for Obama's impeachment earlier this year.

This is one republican initiative that I could not agree with more.  Please, please, please do.  Pleasepleasepleasepleasepleaseplease!

If they do--guaranteed--we take the House back in 2016, win enough Senate seats to comfortably pass the sixty vote threshhold, and Hillary Clinton wins the Electoral College in the biggest rout since Reagan annhilated Mondale.

The republican party--the gift that keeps on giving.

Peace,
emaycee

The answer my friend...

There's not one issue that I disagree with in this piece about how the Democratic Party gives Liberals short shrift...other than the call for Liberals to ultimately break with the Democratic Party.

I, too, hold many of the views in this piece about what the Democratic Party actually believes (though, um, the piece never really answers the question)--other than the drivel at the end about how it may eventually take a third party to change the economic agenda of our nation.

Both pieces ostensibly are calls to arms about the inevitability of one Hillary Rodham Clinton to be the 45th President of the United States.  Unlike when President Obama was first elected, I harbor no illusions that Hillary Clinton will be an economic populist and usher in a new era for American's working class.  There's as much chance of that as there is of her nominating me to be her Secretary of Labor (I'd be great though--my platform?  "Don't like unions?  Fuck you!").

What I do know, though, is that Hillary Clinton will not be Ronald Reagan putting a dagger in the heart of organized labor, killing wage growth, pensions, and employee covered healthcare (yes, boys and girls, when I first began working I paid $0.00 for my family's healthcare coverage), and beginning the income inequality downward spiral that hasn't stopped yet.  She also won't be Bush the Lesser who put a dagger in the middle class and killed its net worth, stagnated its wages, and put together a Supreme Court that only the Chamber of Commerce (and Corporate America) could love.

I don't believe anymore that we'll elect a true Liberal Democrat to the Presidency in my lifetime.  But I believe we will in my kids' lifetimes, and that's good enough.

A third party will insure we never do.  And it's better to tread water with a lukewarm Democrat than drown with a republican in the White House.

We're going to get to economic Shangri-La eventually--it's just going to take some time.

Peace.
emaycee

Do the right thing

Seems the Democrats are having internal discussions (nothing overly serious) about how it will play politically the bolder President Obama goes on unilateral action (read:  republicans are fucking worthless) to lessen the rate of deportations.

I understand that we live in very political times, but when I read this I wondered (and I'm not an historian) how much Democrats thought about politics when FDR pushed through Social Security or the WPA, or how much they did when LBJ pushed through Medicare and the Civil Rights Act.

You know what I hope?  That the President just does the right thing.  If we look out for the least among us and get our asses kicked this November, we'll still be able to say we made America a better place and that's something republicans will be hard pressed to ever claim.

Peace,
emaycee

A not so thin line between love and hate

Seems the leaders of Murrieta, CA are flummoxed because people across America think the good folks of their town aren't compassionate because they a) spit at, b) screamed at until they were red in the face, and c) intimidated so much that their buses fled, a bevy of women and children from nations in Central America trying to escape violence and suppression in their native lands, and find safety and a better life here in America.

Who could have ever fucking guessed?

You know what's left unsaid?  This isn't just the people of Murrieta--it's the modern incarnation of the republican party.  It's reached a point where it's become the party of inclusion (us, Democrats, Liberals, Progessives, the good guys) versus the party of hate.

For the sake of all the ideals American stands for (those realized and those yet to be), this is not a battle we can afford to lose.

Peace,
emaycee

We learn from history

ThinkProgess ran a piece on what the U. S. should learn from the recent beating of an American citizen in Jerusalem, outlining the recent violence that began with the deaths of three kidnapped Israeli teens.  For what it's worth, the piece is fair and tries to find a balance between the desires of each state.

Frankly, though, I've been following politics since 1976 and I stopped paying attention to the Israeli-Palestinian feud in the late 1990s.  It just seemed that both sides would always find a way to make a bad situation worse, no matter the best intentions of third parties.  Nothing has changed in the past fifteen years or so to make me feel any different.  It still seems a good waste of dollars and diplomacy.

I know there are sincere people who believe the two sides can be reconciled, much like the equally violence-prone sides eventually were in Northern Ireland.  Myself, I think the rest of the world should just let them be--maybe once no one other than the Israelis and Palestinians has a stake in their battles, they'll realize just how meaningless the hatred and the violence have become.

Peace,
emaycee

Potty humor

Believe it or not, gestures such as the one above from a Norfolk, Nebraska Fourth of July Parade depicting President Obama as some cornpone with an outhouse for his Presidential Library don't really bother me all that much.  I mean, your average republican has an I.Q. just north of that of a low grade moron and so it makes sense they'd find humor in the dim-witted--so would your average eight year old.

And it's Nebraska, for Christ's sake.

The only difference between Nebraska and the shithole (highest poverty rates, lowest wages, least access to healthcare, highest obesity rates, highest divorce rates, least economic mobility) that the republican party created in the American South is that most of the folks in Nebraska don't speak with a Southern accent.

Peace,
emaycee

U.S.A.! U...s...a...?

On a day when many proud Americans--myself included--screamed "U.S.A.! U.S.A.!" in cheering on our national soccer team's efforts in the World Cup, a group of gutless low-life scum screamed the same at buses full of women in  and children in Murrieta, CA trying to immigrate to America to escape the violence of their native countries in Central America.  Though small in number, their efforts managed to get the buses to leave and head for another safe haven.  No doubt those lily-livered folks considered themselves Patriots who had protected our American values.

Since fucking when did hatred and intimidating already scarred women and children become American values?  How many of these anti-immigrant protesters have the slightest clue what it says on perhaps America's most admired monument, the Statue of Liberty?

"Give me your tired, your poor, 
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, 
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. 
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me. 
I lift my lamp beside the golden door."

Some golden door they have there in Murrieta, CA.  Methinks shouting "U.S.A.!" in the name of hate toward terrified women and children is enough to make a maggot puke.

Peace,
emaycee

A not so beautiful day in the neighborhood

A new Census Bureau report shows that as of 2010 77 million Americans live in a high poverty neighborhood (defined as an area where one in five residents are impoverished), or 25.7% of Americans.  This represents a 42% increase over the 18.1% of Americans who lived in similar neighborhoods in 2000.

Far be it for me to politicize this issue, but it should be noted that republicans controlled the White House in the form of Bush the Lesser (think tax cuts for the wealthy, two unpaid for wars) for eight of those years....

You know what bothers me the most about this?  It's enough to make me wonder if we're headed more and more to an out of sight, out of mind mentality to America's poor.  Let's round them all up in the same neighborhood, and then stay the fuck out of those neighborhoods.  No more poor folks!

The richest nation in the history of the world, my friends, the richest nation in the history of the world.

Peace,
emaycee